


The Great Wide Somewhere

by Missy



Category: Beauty and the Beast (1991)
Genre: Banter, Books, F/M, Fluff, Romance, Travel, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-24
Updated: 2015-12-24
Packaged: 2018-05-08 21:54:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5514674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Missy/pseuds/Missy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When he says they're going to be leaving for tour of the world, Belle's first question involves books.  Just as he predicted.  (Post-canon adventures in the great wide somewhere).</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Great Wide Somewhere

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Who Shot AR (akerwis)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/akerwis/gifts).



> Have a happy holiday season! Hope you like this treat.

Adam awoke to the sound of his wife humming. This was a good sign. A humming Belle meant a happy Belle, and if Belle was happy then he wouldn’t have to spend most of the morning listening to his subject’s worries, worries she cataloged and tried to balm with her every waking hour. He loved her and loved his people with equal fervor - but sometimes even a prince needed to take his crown off and mindlessly cease thinking. Everything - as far as he knew - should be working according to plan outside of their chamber's walls - the grain harvest should be coming in properly, and with Cogsworth taking care of the castle’s winter preparations he and Belle should be completely free to embark on their long-delayed honeymoon.

He rolled onto his back with a grunt, not yet willing to open his eyes and face the morning sunlight. Then he heard a soft curse, followed by the sound of a stack of books tumbling harmlessly end over end onto the bed.

He opened his eyes then, and saw Belle bending over to retrieve a volume of Chaucer from beneath the silken duvet where it had tumbled.

“Dearest, it’s too early in the morning for reading,” he said, causing her to shriek softly and whirl about, her arms filled still with the dusty delights his library offered. “Come to bed,” he begged.

“Oh, but I can’t sleep! I’m wide awake! It’s past seven and I left Viola in quite a mess last night.” A sly smile. "Won't you indulge me just a bit? It's our anniversary after all."

His wife referred to Shakespeare's characters as real people; another endearing quality of hers. But he didn’t give a fig about Viola this early in the morning. “It’s my anniversary too,” he pointed out. “And I demand you return to my…” she strode to the bed, eyebrow up, features set in a wise and quite knowing expression. 

“Now husband, you know there’s no need to order me about.”

“Because you always get your way.”

She smirked. “Not always,” she said lightly. Belle flipped onto the bed, scattering books in her wake, and eagerly opened the book. “Would you like me to read it to you?” she asked.

“Do you think it’ll put me back to sleep?” he asked, earning himself a pillow to his laughing mouth. He’d see how happily biddable his wife would be once he presented her with news of their travels.

%%%%

Her first question was about the books. How many could she take, how many would last her the whole six months, and did they have enough steamer trunks to carry the volumes she planned on buying and bringing home. Adam prepared in a different way – he bought her traveling silks and begged Lumiere to follow them to Britain, but it seemed he was not about to cook for the both of them – BELLE was likely to prefer he not cook for them at all when they were supposed to be roaming free and wild in the country.

“We don’t have to come home after we finish America,” he pointed out. “We could go to Spain, and England.”

She looked up from the list she’d been making (that was Belle – forever making lists to balm the real world's ills, forever trying to keep order so she could escape to the dream inside, forever with her head stuck in some fantasy cloud of some new world that she could pull into being with just the tiniest bit of imagination). “Asia,” she added. “I'd love to see Asia. You don’t think we’re troubling Cogsworth too much?”

“Cogsworth loves this,” he said. “And he’s very good at being in charge. I don’t want you to worry about the place while we’re gone.”

“I’ll try not to…”

“…But I know you, and worry you will,” he said. “Well, we have to trust our family. They love this palace just as much as we do. And we…you know what they'll do.”

She smiled, as she always did, when he called the people of their castle ‘family’. “Love us from a distance?”

“Yes,” he said. “Let me help you pack your books,” he said, bending over the pile.

%%%%

The boat voyage took six months. Six months with a small band of sailors and a group of nuns, with whom Belle discussed the magical worlds of Andersen and Marlowe. He listens to her talk, interjecting commentary now and again – there was something wonderful about the way she expounded on topics of import and he remembered with rue how long he tried to avoid listening to her voice.

They ran into a patch of rough weather soon after the launch, and he’d watch her standing at the prow, absorbing the wind, the rain, the rocking cadence of the ship. She’d never been this far from home before . And she seemed to want to go on and on, until France was just a shadow on the horizon and she was in a new world entirely.

Adam could appreciate the sentiment, even though the reality of it was far from anything they could ever accomplish with the castle in need of their presence.

%%%%

The first thing they did on docking in the colonies was rush to a restaurant, the nicest and busiest one they could locate on advice. She ordered every single exotic-sounding dish she could think of and filled her mouth, moaning her delight as each treat was consumed. He teased her that she’d need her energy and she laughed softly.

“I’m planning on hiking. You’ll need yours, too.”

Only Belle would rather explore than shop, rather see for herself what existed out there than have some aid tell her what the world was. Adam hung in there with her, sans any support, sans any of the luxuries he’d anticipated needing – because she was Belle, and because he was terribly, awfully fond of her wonderfulness. And so they traveled through the trees, holding hands occasionally, trying to learn the names of the redwoods shooting up around them. Adam was patient as her curious eyes took in every single drop of rain, every single ladybug, every single needy-faced creature surrounding them. She seemed to want to absorb the experiences through her skin, to learn what she could about every single one of them – to truly develop a sense of understanding that no royal person had ever bothered to learn.

Eventually they moved to the city, and she conversed with anyone she could find, learned about their lives, learned how similar and different they all were at heart. They would move further on, back across the ocean, to Spain and to England soon enough. 

He asked her if she was happy as they stood on a fall hill, watching the leaves turn with the town’s citizens, listening to their revelry and drinking their cider.

“It’s exactly what I dreamed of,” she said, standing atop the flaming-red hill, the wind blowing through her dark hair. Then she reached for his hand and squeezed it. “Please, let’s keep going.”

And so they did.


End file.
